If you are looking for a New York Style bagel, slightly crispy on the outside and soft and chewy in the center, this recipe is for you!!!

We recently took an anniversary trip to the Big Apple, and I devoured bagels for breakfast (and even sometimes lunch) everyday. Some people take taco tours when they travel, this felt like a bagel tour. We enjoyed different flavors of bagels with all different types of schmear slathered on top.

What is schmear?? The most delicious buttery or cream cheese based topping to make your bagel into a true delight!! We will include our cranberry orange schmear at the bottom of this post, after the bagel recipe!

We love this schmear not only on bagels, but with crackers, pretzels, and fresh fruit. It’s a super tasty appetizer for parties, the holidays or as a gift for a friend!

This post may contain Amazon or other affiliate links, meaning that if you choose to click through and make a purchase, I will receive a small commission for sharing at no cost to you. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

Video Block

Double-click here to add a video by URL or embed code. Learn more

New York Style Bagels

Ingredients for dough:

6 cups flour

2 cups water

1/2 cup sugar

1 TBSP salt

*1 TBSP yeast

egg (optional)

*just a little side note on the yeast. Red Star is my favorite. I buy it in bulk and keep it in the freezer. I've never had a problem with it getting old.

Ingredients for water bath:

3 quarts water

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 TBSP salt

Directions:

Combine your 2 cups warm water (about 100 F degrees) with the 1 TBSP yeast. Then add 1/2 cup sugar, 1 TBSP salt and 6 cups flour. There's a couple ways you can mix your dough. Kneading is very important in bagel making. You want to activate that gluten for a nice chew.

Here are two mixing options I use:

My favorite is using the bread maker on the dough cycle. I like doing this because I just dump everything in and come back to it after an hour and a half.
If you're using a bread maker- toss it all in (warm water, yeast, sugar, salt and flour) and put it on the dough cycle.
If you're using a mixer, put everything in the mixer (warm water, yeast, sugar, salt and flour) and let it work with a dough hook for 30 minutes. Then let it rise for one hour.

When the dough is done rising, it's time to get your water bath boiling. Pour 3 quarts of water into a large pot. Bring to a boil. Add 1/4 cup brown sugar and 1 TBSP salt. While your water bath is coming to a boil, preheat your oven to 425 F degrees, and begin shaping your bagels.

Cut your dough into 8 separate parts (This recipe makes 8 large bagels).

Roll each part into a ball. (If you are adding any mix ins, such as raisins, chocolate chips, cheese, jalapenos, etc. This is the stage where you want to do this.) Then poke your fingers through the center of the roll and rotate your fingers to make a smooth hole. You want your hole to be at least the size of a quarter (it will shrink down during the other processes).

Next, add your bagels into the water bath and boil for 2 mins on on side, flip, and do another 1-2 minutes on the other side. Make sure you have room for the bagels to swell as they are boiling. Usually, I can only fit 2-3 bagels in my pot at a time.

Pull out of the boiling water and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. If you have a lot of water splashing around, you can dab the bagel and parchment with a paper towel. Continue until all the bagels are boiled.

Next we are going to dress your bagels. I like to brush my bagels lightly with egg wash (1 egg + 1 tsp water whisked together), but this is optional. It gives the bagels a beautiful color when they are finished baking.

Stick your bagels into your 425 F degrees preheated oven for 17-20 minutes (depending on your oven- all ovens are a little different). Pull bagels out and place on a rack to cool.

Your plain bagels are ready to eat!! Now if you want to go a little further than a plain bagel, we want to dress them up after we brush on the egg wash, but before we put them in the oven. There are so many different flavor options. Here are some of our favorites:

Cinnamon Raisin - add 1/2 TBSP of raisins and 2 dashes of cinnamon for each bagel. Mix these into the dough when you are shaping the bagels
Cinnamon Sugar (you can combine this with the cinnamon raisin and it’s amazing!!) - get 1 TBSP sugar and 3 dashes of cinnamon. Stir together. After bagel is brushed with egg wash, dip it in the cinnamon sugar mixture
Everything Bagel - after brushed with egg wash, sprinkle with Everything But the Bagel Seasoning (these make amazing sandwiches!!)
Salt (in NYC they call these “salt” bagels, in Texas we call them pretzel bagels- for a true pretzel skin, add 2 TBSP baking soda to your water bath) - after brushing with egg wash, sprinkle with kosher salt (these are great with sweet or savory toppings)
Sesame or Poppyseed - Pour 1 TBSP seeds onto a plate. After bagel is brushed with egg wash, dip it in the bagel in the seeds
Cheese bagel - . After bagel is brushed with egg wash, sprinkle with 2 TBSP grated cheese. (If you want the bagel itself to be a little more savory, you can also mix in a dash of garlic powder, herbs or jalapenos at the stage when you are shaping the bagel.)